On May 29, Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev officially inaugurated the first phase of the long-awaited flagship project Southern Gas Corridor (SGC), through which Caspian natural gas from the Shah-Deniz II field will be transported to Europe. The new project consists of several pipeline networks that pass through Georgia and Turkey (via the Trans-Anatolian Pipeline, TANAP) and further through Greece, Albania and Italy (via the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline, TAP). As Shah Deniz Stage 2 is implemented, gas production will increase from 9 to 25 billion cubic meters (bcm) per year.

EU neighboring countries such as Georgia are carefully monitoring the Brexit negotiations. Georgian government officials worry that Brexit will further delay Georgia’s Euro-Atlantic integration. Under a post-Brexit French-German leadership, few expect significant changes to the EU’s neighborhood and enlargement policy. The lack of new incentives short of a membership perspective will be a setback for Tbilisi, which is keen to determine new perspectives on further integration. To advance its Euro-Atlantic integration it should temper its expectations and focus on implementing reforms associated with the AA/DCFTA, exploring defense and security co-operation, and engage with the public on the European Union and its policies.

The Free Trade Agreement between China and Georgia, signed in 2017, came into force on January 1. This will allow Georgian products free access to one of the world’s largest consumer markets, and will free approximately 94 percent of Georgian products from customs taxes. The growth of China’s economic interests has increased Georgia’s hope of playing a role in in Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). By extension, China’s increasing presence in the South Caucasus raises questions regarding the compatibility of Beijing’s interests with those of the region’s traditional hegemon, Russia.

Recently, Kazakhstan, Georgia and Azerbaijan proclaimed their support for and recognition of Spain’s territorial integrity. These announcements were obviously triggered by the outbreak of the crisis around Catalonia’s independence referendum. While Spain’s political destiny is hardly a vital interest for these governments, they do worry about the continuing episodes of minority unrest that could furnish precedents for the dissolution of other multi-ethnic or multi-confessional states like them. On this point, these three governments, probably along with all the others in what used to be the Soviet Union, have justified reasons for concern.

On October 30, 2017, Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev, along with Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Georgia’s Prime-minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili, Kazakhstan’s Prime Minister Bakytzhan Sagintayev, and Uzbekistan’s Prime Minister Abdulla Aripov attended the opening ceremony of the long-delayed Baku-Tbilisi-Kars (BTK) railway. “The opening of the railway is of historic and strategic significance,” Aliyev said at the ceremony in the Caspian port city of Alat, south of Baku, to mark the departure of the first trains. In fact, the opening of the new railway provides an alternative route to existing rail services carrying goods from Asia to Europe.

The Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst is a biweekly publication of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Program, a Joint Transatlantic Research and Policy Center affiliated with the American Foreign Policy Council, Washington DC., and the Institute for Security and Development Policy, Stockholm. For 15 years, the Analyst has brought cutting edge analysis of the region geared toward a practitioner audience.